Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli issued a legal opinion today on the subject of state regulation of abortion clinics at the request of Delegate Bob Marshall, something sure to send infanticide apologists into a frenzy. As with Cuccinelli’s opinion on the authority of state law enforcement officers to question suspected illegal aliens about their immigration status, it hardly breaks new ground, but deviating in any way from the liberal party line always gets the moonbats in a lather.

Based on a thorough review of existing law and relevant prior court decisions, the attorney general’s opinion is that the commonwealth has the authority to regulate, so long as the regulations adhere to constitutional limitations as articulated by the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit in Greenville Women’s Clinic v. Bryant. The court said that state regulations that do not interfere with the woman’s status as the ultimate decisionmaker, that serve “a valid purpose,” and that do not “strike at the [abortion] right itself,” are valid regulations.

The left is petrified that by requiring these “clinics” to have medical facilities commensurate with the internal medical procedures they perform will result in a majority of these clinics going out of business, so their starting position in this debate is that any regulations Virginia would impose would inevitably deviate from the opinion Cuccinelli just wrote. Instead of actually looking at the rather clear wording of the opinion which talks specifically about the limits of permitted potential regulations under the law, they’re already starting with the presumption that any regulations that could possibly be implemented will utterly strip women of their current legal right to murder their unborn children and serve no purpose other than to effectively outlaw abortion. Once again, reading comprehension is proven to be a skill particularly challenging for the left.

The recent opinions of the Attorney General don’t break any new legal ground and adhere to the flawed state of current jurisprudence almost to a degree that it frustrates conservatives, who would be much happier if, say, General Cuccinelli declared that under the Virginia Constitution the Commonwealth had no authority to regulate the possession of firearms by persons not proscribed by federal law, and effectively did away with all state laws regarding the manufacture, transfer or carry of firearms. He’d be right to do such a thing, but that’s not the way this Attorney General operates. He simply lays out in clear terms what the current law is, teeing up legislative opportunities for conservative bulls like Delegate Marshall to ram through the General Assembly and towards the Governor’s desk. He set’s ‘em up, and Bob (and others) knock ‘em down.

Unless you subscribe to the notion that liberals are idiots who can’t read, you have to come to the conclusion that’s what liberals are most concerned about. Having someone issue opinions that don’t conform to the law and which are easily struck down by the courts shouldn’t be of great concern to them. It’s a fundraising opportunity, it gives them ammunition to claim conservatives are wrong, and the courts eventually humiliate such efforts. What concerns them is someone who carefully points out not the “living interpretation” of current law, but what it actually means, lending ammunition to conservatives in the executive and the legislature to dismantle all that screwy social engineering that wasn’t supported by law or reason in the first place.

Ken Cuccinelli is a liberal’s worst nightmare. That’s why they’re howling. It’s not that they can’t read, it’s that they have to find some way to counter, and demagoguery is about the only tactic left open to them.

The opinions expressed here are solely the views of the author, and not representative of the position of any organization, political party, doughnut shop, knitting guild, or waste recycling facility, but may be correctly attributed to the Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy. If anything in the above article has offended you, please click here to receive an immediate apology.

You can follow the discussion through the Comments feed.
You can also pingback or trackback
from your own site.

Kudos to the AG! Bob Marshall may have done Manassas City Council a favor since the Mayor reactivated a former Council Committee to look at the issue of the Clinic in Manassas. Fact finding mission to determine what other localities with such clinics have for regulation. The AG Memo will certainly be a boost to the MCC work in terms of what the local regulation may or may not be.

Of course, that means Citizens Time may have another parade of folks when the Council resumes next month.

I have to laugh at the liberals who claim that they want abortion legal so it would be done at a “safe” clinic. Then AG Cuccinelli then says, OK, you want the clinics to be safe and healthy places, here are the regulations. He bascially called them out on their claims and use their old tool of regulation against them. That’s why they are whining.

Not sure why people would get upset over this one. I know I am in the minority in this blog when it comes to being pro-choice, but I dont think anyone can argue that these clinics should be regulated as a hospital or urgent care center is regulated…makes sense

PWCOvertaxed, if changes need to be made in the way these clinics are regulated shouldn’t that be addressed by our elected representatives in the legislature. Otherwise a future AG can issue an opinion that says the opposite of Cuccinelli’s. And then a subsequent AG might issue yet another different opinion.

The fact that several attempts to make these changes have failed in the legislature may indicate that they are not so advisable or needed as proponents would have us believe. The fact is this is not about improving health care for women. There is no evidence of problems at these clinics. No evidence of women receiving poor care and being harmed. This is about finding back door ways to end abortion by anti-abortion forces rather than convincing a majority of the people and their representatives to end the practice. Something they have been unable to do.

I certainly have no problem with people attempting to outlaw abortion if that is the will of the majority. But it seems that, having failed to convince a majority of their fellow citizens of the correctness of their position, many of the anti-abortion people have decided that lying and misleading others is an acceptable way to influence public policy.

An odd way for people who so often cite their religious beliefs as informing their public positions to behave.

Very few people believe this is being done to protect the health of the mother. It is being done to harass the clinics through increased government regulation. I fully respect the AG and others for being anti choice, but I don’t like the false cover they are choosing. False cover is bad no matter which party is doing it. It goes to the credibility of all involved.

Let me be clear. This gal was abducted in the USA and taken to Mexico.

Our federal government has voted themselves pay raises, fat pensions, and a health care plan. But they have failed to secure our nation.

Why do I have to pay income taxes? Our federal government doesn’t uphold the laws against illegal immigration. What am I getting for my money? Why can they use the threat of jail against me when they don’t use it against illegal aliens? None of this makes any sense to me.

What a man-crush you have on these nerds, Greg. When are Cuccinelli and Marshall gonna grow a set and take abortion head-on and introduce legislation to make it illegal? Know why? Because they know they don’t have the votes and the Supreme Court decisions in their favor, and its gonna lose in the General Assembly, that’s why. Otherwise they would. The majority of Virginians are pro-choice and would vote both of them out if they did. How much of my tax money are they wasting on this dead end grandstanding? How about figuring out how to create jobs and get the economy rolling again instead of reciting Virginia code like a first year law student at a second rate law school.

Nothing in Roe v. Wade took away the authority of state health departments to regulate sanitary conditions in clinics that provide abortions. The question asked and the AG’s answer were sort of a knock-knock joke in which the parties merely repeat what everyone already knew. The issue doesn’t really arise unless regulations are changed (I assume that there are some already in place). People who get excited about this on either side of the abortion issue are easily played by grandstanding pols.

How many state legislatures (and governors) will be Republican after this fall’s elections?

When will the citizenry be sufficiently fed up with the federal government to demand that less power be vested in Washington and more in state capitals?

When do the states rights advocates have sufficient critical mass to force a constitutional reckoning with the federal government?

Cuccinelli is at the vanguard of a re-energized states rights movement. I think the stars might be aligned for the states to claw back many of the rights guaranteed to the states by the constitution but usurped by the federal government.

Maybe that won’t change much in Minnesota but it would sure change things here.

Ah, naive Groveton. Critical mass was reached in 1861. If a state freely joined the Union, they could freely leave, right? WRONG! 600,000+ killed was the price paid for that little civics experiment. Wanna try that one again? Let the streets be filled with the blood of liberals? As Ochocinco would say, “Child, please.”

I said nothing about violence. Not a word. The US Constitution provides for two mechanisms for the amendment of that constitution. The first approach, which has been the approach always used, is for Congress to start the process with a proposed amendment.

However, there is a clearly specified second path. That path requires 2/3 of the state legislatures to call for a constitutional convention. This is completely and totally beyond the veto of the federal government. I believe the states then have to pass the new constitution by a 3/4 vote.

Could critical mass be achieved with only the threat of a state - called constitutional convention? That would take 33 states. How many will be Republican by this fall? How about two years later? How many have already enacted 10th Amendment legislation?

I think the US Congress and the administration of any president - Democrat or Republican - would get very nervous if the constitutional convention process even got started. They might decide that performing the duties required of them in the US Constitution - like enforcing the immigration laws really needed to get done. They might decide that forcing citizens into contracts with private companies is really something they can’t do.

I believe the US Supreme Court is within 2 years of deciding that same sex marriage is a right protected by the US Constitution. While I support equal rights for gay people, I don’t believe those rights are mandated (or prohibited) by the constitution in its present form. The 10th Amendment clearly specifies that any power not specifically given to the federal government or reserved to the people are the province of the states. SAme sex marriage is one of those things. And, more important than my opinion on the issue, a clear majority of Virginia voters rejected the Virginia constitutional amendment for same sex marriage. This is just another example of where I believe the federal government will, once again, over-step its rights.

Now, we have a US Congress which is despised by the majority of Americans. We have an administration which is receiving horrendously low approval ratings. We have a former administration which received horrible approval ratings.

This fall, a whole bunch of new Cuccinellis will be elected in other states.

How long will it take for critical mass around the 10th Amendment, a constitutional convention called by the states, etc?

This has nothing to do with civil war or violence. Cuccinelli and his ilk won’t need guns if Obama, Pelosi, etc keep the national government on its present course.

Does anyone actuallly know what regulations they are talking about? With medical there are three levels of service as defined by the national fire protection agency 70 national electrical code article 517-health care facilities, hospital, ambulatory health care, and doctors office.Read through the definitions and its requirement gregg so that why you will know what he has interpreted. This code is adopted by the general assembly so it become virginia state code. currently, when you go to the dentist and get under the gas and they drill a holein your jaw, it is not “regulated” in the sense by definition to our attorny general. When you go to the proctologist and they stick a large microscope in a test tube up your spinkter , not regulated by definition to cuccinellies interpretation. These areas only requier standard emergency egress lighting with exit signs and special two conductor electrical ground systems.

Having a pea sucked out of a uterist is no different than the aforementioned proceedures. An ambulatory health care regulation is mainly electrical in nature PERIOD. It is a space that requires a very complex electrical emergency generator. To have a generator of sufficient size for your house, it cost 13,000 to install. To convert an existing dental clinic, protologist procedure room and first trimester abortion clinic the cost for the specialized electrical recircuiting would be around 70,000 to 150,000 for a small practice.
no patients spend the night in such facility but people are unable to get out on their own since they may be in outpatient surgery and the doc needs to hurry up b4 the generator runs out of fuel.

The next step is hospital and I think that is self explanitory.

Just another punk a**** political stunt by someones social agenda manipulating the public by there ignorance. When you go tothe dentist in the future for a cavity and it cost you 2000 dollars, just look at that shy grin of McDonalds and that him. Enough is enough, he needs to reign in his boy a little bit and go after kiddie porns and corruption in the towing industry which financed his campaign and our gainesville supervisors.

Apparently, according to some abortion on demand advocates, fetuses pose a danger to mothers because under certain conditions they are flammable. In order to protect the health and life of the mother, some are aborted in order to reduce the risk of spontaneous combustion of a mother’s womb.

That’s about as reasonable as those “life of the mother” arguments seem to get, actually.

The AG’s opinion supports the Gov. directing
the STATE Health Department to inspect abortion clinics. The
Commonwealth of Virginia, far more than any local jurisdiction,
has the resources to inspect the cllinics and also legally defend
their actions in court. (The City of Manassas, for example,
doesn’t have its own health department and, consequently, no
employee qualified to conduct medical facility or procedure
inspections). It is now up to Gov. McDonnell to take action.

Because it is the “regulation that they will impose on abortion clinics to shut them down for the time being? What type of regulations do you guys think he was talking about? The general assembly has been nocking the proposal to change first trimester abortion clinics from doctors offices to ambulatory health care facilities. As we can tell from our ignorant breathern, the main reason for cucineli to impose the higher standards is not for will of protecting a womans life but to make it cost prohibitive. The NFPA to those of you office pukes who have no clue as to 14% of the economy deals with life safety if anyone were to have read the aforementioned article.

Busted argument! What the hell do you think internal proceedurs mean? Ambulatory health care facility which requires, as part of increased regulation , a complete rewire of the electrical system so the f****ing lights stay on while the straw is sucking out a pea. A####whipe.

Cuccinelli does not regulate or legislate anything. The governor and the state board of health regulate health care facilities. The General Assembly legislates rules for health facilities. Virginia’s Attorney General does neither.

What does he do?

Well, lots of things. But, relevent to this, he advises state legislators about the legaility / constitutionality of possible, hypothetical legislation. In the immediate case, Cuccinelli was asked if it would be legal to increase the regulation of abortion clinics.

This wasn’t a very hard question.

in 1995, South Carolina passed a law that seems very similar to the possible, hypothetical legislation which formed the basis of the question sent to Mr. Cucconelli. The law was tested in court. A federal judge upheld the law. The US Supreme Court refused to hear the appeal without comment.

So, it seems that South Carolina’s enacted law is legal. Therefore, Mr. Cuccinelli told the Virginia legislators that a similar law passed by the general assembly or regulations enforced by the board of health would probably be legal here too.

Of course, since Mr. Cuccinelli regulates and legislates nothing he can’t do anything about the abortion clinics. Gov McDonnell could, arguably, increase the level of regulation. However, he would have to get around a state board of health still controlled by apointees from prior Democratic governors. The GA could legislate tougher standards but that would have to pass through a State Senate still controlled by the Deomcrats.

Meanwhile, we have liberals howling at the moon over Ken Cuccinelli’s very reasonable interpretation of the matter based on the South Carolina law.

How lucky for Republicans that Democrats can’t stay focused on anything of importance … like the economy for example.

So lets kill business with more regulations that are only going to keep the lights on by generator so the woman can pull the straw out? The proceedure rooms have emergency battery back up lights allready. Nothing but a stunt by some religious belief that some pea sized sack of cells has a soul and is a person. So when some big black deranged mental retard or retarded illegal allien who is 4′10′ and looks like a chuwawa rapes your 13 year old daughter, are your going to enjoy takeing her to adoption therapy or maybe you will let her keep it so you can go to church with it. Thats the reality.

When are you going to read my public record? On more than one occasion I have introduced bills to affirm legal personhood for children before birth with the purpose of a challange to Roe. One made it to the floor of the House of Delegates despite the opposition of the Republican Leadership. That was HB 2797 in 2007. Here is the language:
“Whereas, the Constitution of Virginia provides in Article 1, §1, that all men are by nature equally free and independent and have certain inherent rights, of which, when they enter into a state of society, they cannot, by any compact, deprive or divest their posterity; namely, the enjoyment of life and liberty, with the means of acquiring and possessing property, and pursuing and obtaining happiness and safety; now, therefore,

Be it enacted by the General Assembly of Virginia:

1. § 1. That life begins at the moment of fertilization and the right to enjoyment of life guaranteed by Article 1, § 1 of the Constitution of Virginia is vested in each born and preborn human being from the moment of fertilization.”

The bill lost 45 to 52. But it was the first ever vote in Virginia’s Assembly on the question.

We teach Virginia third graders that human life begins at fertilization.